Most Likely To
by sej1986
Summary: Jack & Chloe. The monthly CTU party was never fun...


Most Likely To

She'd run out of excuses, and now Bill Buchanan was hovering awkwardly in her living room, probably wondering what the hell he was doing there. He wasn't the only one. Her normally chaotic living room had been cleaned to within an inch of its life (and Chloe's); the coffee table unused to a dust free surface, the couch reunited with its full set of matching cushions. People were now sprawled over said couch, and Chloe was sure she had seen someone spill something on it. They were just lucky she was all but confined to the kitchen; as hostess, she had high expectations to live up to.

The monthly CTU 'party' was never fun, nor was it a party. Oh, it had been on the few occasions it had been held at Milo's, but most people generally couldn't remember those nights. The rest of the time, the other staff took it in turns to host the gathering. Or, in Chloe's case, they spent the time thinking up excuses as to why their home couldn't possibly be a suitable place for a group of underpaid Government workers to unwind after a particularly nasty day.

She had tried everything. Relatives that had long since died had died again; non existent cats had gone missing, only to be found the next day safe and sound. This time Buchanan had smelled a rat. Okay, so maybe saying that her laptop had exploded wasn't a good idea. He was bound to figure out that she could quite easily have fixed it. That is, if it had broken in the first place. He'd just shaken his head, and pointed to the list of employees on the screen in front of him. Why he had a list of people who hadn't hosted the party Chloe didn't know, but anyway, her name was right at the top. She'd scowled, and huffed, and generally acted a little bit immature even by her standards, but it hadn't gotten her anywhere. "One night, Chloe. That's all I'm asking." He'd smiled that smile and she'd weakened. "Okay, fine. But don't expect anything great."

Great it wasn't. But it was okay. She had to admit that, standing in the hallway only minutes before the first of the guests had arrived and surveying her handiwork. "Not bad, O'Brian," she muttered to herself, running through a mental checklist. Bedroom door: locked. Laptop: locked in bedroom. Spare laptop: locked in spared bedroom. Breakables, i.e the hideous but somehow cute china dog her mother had bought her back when they had been speaking: locked safely in a cupboard. Photos... she didn't have any of them up so that saved her running around figuring out places to hide them.

The music wasn't loud. She knew people were bored but she couldn't think of a damn thing to do about it. She tried to act like she didn't care, but she _did _care. A part of her was still that girl that wanted everyone to like her, although the more rational part of her mind told her it didn't really matter. Bill caught her eye and smiled. She shot him her best glare and turned back into the kitchen. Food that she had left work early to buy was now slowly going bad on her worksurfaces. No one seemed to want the potato chips she'd laid out. She had worried momentarily that maybe potato chips weren't the in thing anymore, but then dismissed that idea. Everyone liked potato chips.

_Maybe it's you they don't like._

And there it was, the reason why she hadn't been invited to parties in high school, and hence the reason why she didn't know what on earth she was meant to do when holding her own. She'd _never _held her own party. Never. Not once. Her mother had grown exasperated with her. Chloe and her sisters had grown up wanting the same thing; to be popular. While Linda and Rachel chose to pursue this, Chloe soon resigned herself to the fact that she and popularity didn't go well together. At least, not as well as she and laptops, and no one wants to be friends with someone who has a computer surgically attached to them. Her mother's words, and then later, her own.

"Lovely party, O'Brian, but I'm afraid me and the guys have got some more, ah, pressing issues to attend to."

Chloe snapped out of her thoughts and back to the nightmare now occurring in front of her. A group of field agents, most of them new, were leering their goodbyes at her. "Yeah, fine, whatever," she muttered, not turning from the sink. "Nice to know you had a good time. Thanks for coming, don't let me cramp your style. Wouldn't want the girls at the bar thinking you'd spent an evening with me." Even her sarcasm was failing her. She heard the agents laugh as they clattered along the hallway and out of her house.

"Don't worry about them," came a smooth, low, almost whispered voice from behind her. It had the same effect on her as it always did; she felt a blush creep up her neck and her hands start to shake. "It's fine, Chloe. You're doing okay."

How did he know... she gave up. She should have given up a long time ago but couldn't. He knew her, better than she knew herself sometimes. He could always read her mind, or her eyes, even when she had her back to him. "It's not _fine_, Jack. But hey, I don't care. Just one more hour and then everyone will be out of here and I can go back to doing what I always do, being me."

"I like you being you."

This time she rolled her eyes. "What does that even mean, Jack?" She pushed away from the sink and busied herself with replacing things in the cupboards. She knew he was stood there, watching her, but she refused to meet his eyes. When she did eventually look up, he'd gone.

Twenty minutes later Chloe knew she'd have to give the game up eventually, and go out to speak to her 'guests.' She had a hard time being nice in the first place; enforced captivity with coworkers who could hardly stand her did not put her in the most sociable of moods. One foot out of the kitchen however and she sensed that all was not right.

Raucous laughter was coming from the living room. Either someone had smuggled in extra alcohol, or-

"Listen to this... look, let me find it." The sound of pages being turned followed, and then the speaker cleared his throat. "Chloe Keeson, most likely to-"

She flew the rest of the way into the room, wrestling the book out of the hands of someone she barely recognised. The laughter soon stopped.

"Get out of my house," she muttered, her voice shaking with anger and tears building rapidly behind her eyes. "All of you. Get out. Now."

"It's only a bit of fun-"

"NOW!"

One by one, they filed from the room, collecting their belongings from the hall cupboard as they went. Bill Buchanan wasn't among them. She knew he would have put a stop to it if he had been there. So would Jack... glancing wildly around she saw that he'd long gone.

She waited until the door had slammed shut and then she set about ripping the book to shreds. One by one the pieces fluttered to the ground, until her living room floor was coated in a sea of white. The empty cover she threw aimlessly somewhere in front of her. It was something she should have done years ago. Come to think of it, she wasn't even really sure why she _hadn't _done it years ago.

_Because you're weak. Because you're still that girl you were back in high school._

"No! No no no no no..." Chloe sank to her knees, her hands trembling violently. "I'm not, I'm not..."

Arms caught her before she could fully hit the floor. She resisted at first, wanting to be left alone to wallow in her own pity, but the arms tightened around her until she found herself sitting in someone's lap. Maybe Bill had stayed after all, and kept a distance while she broke down. She would have to bribe him into not telling everyone else-

"Everything's okay, I promise. You can open your eyes now," he murmured, tilting her head up until her eyes met his. They were so blue, and so sad. "They've all gone. It's just you and me now."

She began wriggling once more. Just how much of her little performance he had seen she wasn't sure, but it was more than enough. "I think you should go, Jack. I need to clean up."

"I was out back, getting some fresh air. If I'd known what they were doing..."

"You don't have to explain, Jack. I'm not some poor defenceless woman that you need to protect, okay? I need to clean up, so please, let me go and get out of my house."

His arms slackened and she stumbled to her feet. "What did that mean?" he whispered.

"What did what mean?"

He shook his head. "Never mind. I'll go."

"Yes, please."

She heard him close the front door behind him, heard his car start up outside. She didn't stop working, though. If she stopped focussing even for one minute on picking up the pieces of paper on the floor she would start crying, and she wasn't going to cry. Not tonight.

"They told me I was most likely to fail at anything I did."

Chloe whirled round, almost dropping the china dog as she retrieved it and set it back in its rightful place. "How the hell did you- never mind. The back door is open, isn't it? And a small fence isn't going to stop you." She could have sworn she saw him smile at that. "You know me so well."

She shrugged. "Yeah."

"Let me help you tidy up?"

"I'm done."

"Oh."

"I'm going to bed now."

"Aren't you going to shut the back door?" He had a twinkle in his eye. "You never know who else might get in."

Rolling her eyes, Chloe pushed past him and into the now darkened kitchen. She shut, locked and bolted the back door under his watchful eye. "See, all done. I guess that means you'll have to go out the front... or- no, never mind. It's silly."

He frowned. "What is it?"

She looked anywhere but at him. "Well, it's late, and I was going to say you could crash here if you wanted to but you probably don't want to, I mean, why the hell should you, you're just my coworker, right? You're only here to make me feel better." Chloe shook her head. "No. Just go. Please. It will be too embarrassing to explain at work tomorrow."

"I'll stay here tonight, Chloe." His voice was so soft, and so low. She felt her heart start thudding in her chest. "Because you asked me, and because I want to."

That was not the answer she had been expecting. She knew she was blushing but couldn't do anything to stop it. "I'll, uh, set up the guest room..." she muttered, moving away from him and up the stairs. "You can come up too," she added, knowing that he was hesitating out of a mixture of fear and politeness. "I don't bite. I might get a little cranky as I'm tired, but you know that."

His footsteps on the stairs behind her made her feel safe. She would sleep better now that he was in the house. "It's just through here," she nodded, leading the way. "It's nothing big. I'll just get you a spare towel." She wrung her hands. "And another pillow?"

"No, two is fine."

"Okay. Well." She looked down at her hands. "I guess I'll see you tomorrow." She turned on her heel and left the room before she could say anything else to embarrass herself.

Once in the relative safety of her bedroom, Chloe set about her nightly routine of shedding her clothes and slipping into her old tracksuit bottoms and college t-shirt that she used for night clothes. Jack's presence had allowed her to temporarily forget what had happened earlier, but it was slowly drifting back to the forefront of her mind. She'd hunted high and low for the cover of the book but to no avail. It would have to lurk wherever it had fallen until she could work up the energy to look for it properly.

Jack... he was in her guest bedroom, and it was driving her crazy. She couldn't work out why he was there. She'd run over various different scenarios in her head, none of them making sense. For a second she thought that Audrey must be worried about him, but Audrey wasn't in Jack's life any more. That was for the best; he knew it as well as she did. Fleetingly, Chloe wondered if the other woman was happy, and sincerely hoped that she was.

Her room was far too cold. She couldn't sleep with the window shut but tonight she was going to have to unless she wanted to freeze to death. Sighing, she rolled out of her bed and padded over to the window, reaching out and pulling it tight.

_"They told me I was most likely to fail at anything I did."_

His words came unbidden into her head; with a start, she appreciated the true effect that this must have had on him. She'd thought he had said it to try and make her feel better but Jack Bauer never lied, especially not to her. He didn't know how to.

Chloe grabbed up her pillows and slowly left the room, walking purposefully across to his. She pushed the door open and was unsurprised to find him still awake. "They told me I was most likely to end up all alone," she said quietly.

He held out his arms to her and she moved quickly towards him, burying her head against his chest. "I'm so sorry for what they said about you," she murmured, her small hands clutching at the material of his t-shirt. "They were so wrong, you know that?"

"They were wrong about you, too," he soothed, shifting so that she could climb into the bed beside him.

"I'm not so sure, Jack. You didn't know me back in high school-"

"They were wrong, Chloe." He smiled sadly. "I know you _now. _You're not going to be alone. I won't let you be. I know you don't need protecting," he added, seeing her frown, "but... everyone needs someone, right?"

"Right," she replied, swallowing hard.

He pressed a trembling hand to the side of her face. "Don't be scared, Chloe. I'm not."

"I want to stay in here with you tonight," she told him in response, covering his hand with her own.


End file.
